NEW DELHI - Over 24,000 people have asked big manufacturers of processed foods in India, including Nestle, Britannia and Hindustan Unilever, not to use genetically modified (GM) foods after Greenpeace put up a list of companies that could be using GM products.

The NGO put up a list on the internet 11 days ago mentioning firms that did or did not say they used such foods.

The public response to the website safefoodnow.org has forced five of the 11 firms on its ‘red list’ to write to Greenpeace — which started the site — clarifying that they did not use any GM material in the food they sold in India.

GM foods are banned in the country.

The original ‘red list’ and ‘green list’ had been put up on the basis of responses received from processed food giants when Greenpeace asked them if they used any GM material in the food, according to Jaikrishna R. the NGO’s campaigner for sustainable agriculture.

Since the lists were put up, Nestle, Agro Tech Foods, Cadbury, Britannia and Hindustan Unilever has written to Greenpeace saying they do not use any GM products in the foods they sold in India, Jaikrishna said. These firms were earlier on the ‘red list’ because they had not responded to questions from the NGO.

However, the Nestle management had written that they believed GM food was a good idea, which atitude Jaikrishna condemned, pointing out that many Nestle consumers had now written to the firm saying they did not want any GM ingredient in the food.